Sponsorships for the GRC Annual Meeting & Expo are now available. These are great opportunities for companies to get more exposure at the largest annual geothermal energy gathering in the world.

The 2018 meeting will take place in Reno, Nevada from October 14th through the 17th.The four-day event will offer technical, policy, and market conference sessions, educational seminars, tours of local geothermal and renewable energy projects, an expo and numerous networking opportunities.

Geothermal energy, which currently accounts for about 1 percent of installed capacity, is another renewable energy technology with significant growth potential. Mexico already has the fifth-largest installed geothermal power capacity after the United States, the Philippines, Indonesia, and New Zealand, and another 13.4 GW of potential.

The government has put significant funding into developing new technologies through its Geothermal Innovation Center. As a volcanic region, Mexico has significant potential for geothermal, a firm energy source that can complement intermittent sources such as wind and solar. The resource potential is spread throughout the country, but concentrated in the volcanic central, eastern, and southern regions.

We are searching for the next Head of Generation at our Wairakei (Taupo) Geothermal site – could this be you?

A vital role to the successful running of the power station, we are looking for someone who shares the sites’ strategy to be internationally recognised as a leader in safe, reliable and efficient generation operations and geothermal innovation. In this role you will bring your strategic and operational leadership skills to the fore to deliver safe and efficient operations while focussing on continuous improvement to future proof the site, improve plant reliability and support and enable our people. You will also contribute to Contact’s aspiration of leading the decarbonisation of New Zealand’s energy sector by 2022.

You will be a strong and engaging leader, always striving to get the best from your people. Collaboration across the site and the portfolio are of upmost importance in this role so you must be someone who is highly skilled in this area. You are also someone who is good at building strong and lasting relationships not only with team members, colleagues and peers but also local communities in around the Taupo region.

Roles like these don’t come along often so if you think you have the skills and experience to help take this power station forward, while working in a township famous for its geothermal activity and many other beautiful natural wonders, we would love to hear from you

Ormat Technologies Inc. provides an update that on May 30, 2018, due to the approaching lava, the substation of the Puna complex and an adjacent warehouse that stored a drilling rig were burned. Both items are expected to be covered by the company’s insurance policies. Due to the long lead time of constructing a new substation and the extent of the damage to HELCO’s transmission lines, the company cannot asses when the Puna complex will be able to resume operation and deliver power to the grid.

The approaching lava also covered and blocked the main access road to the power plant. Alternative access road is currently open.

As announced on May 28, the approaching lava covered the wellheads of two geothermal wells. The company cannot assess at this stage the extent of the damage to the future functionality of these wells. As of today, the lava did not cover any additional wells. The lava continues to flow and may reach other wells and areas of the Puna facility.

Vigorous eruption of lava continues from the lower East Rift Zone (LERZ) fissure system in the area of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens.

Fissure 8 continues to maintain eruptive fountains reaching 200-250 feet. Subsidiary fountains in the vicinity of Fissure 8 are also active although with much less vigor, seldom exceeding 60 feet in height. This fountaining continues to feed a lava flow that is moving north out of Leilani Estates and then northeast along Highway 132 into the area of Noni Farms road. Flow front advance has slowed to less than 50 yards per hour.

Borealis Geopower Inc. is a renewable geothermal energy company based in Calgary, Alberta with plans to drill geothermal wells to produce renewable power and heat.

The well authorizations will allow the company to begin drilling for collection of geotechnical and temperature gradient information.

The Commission issued the well authorizations on May 29, 2018 and represents the first time the Commission has issued a well authorization under the Geothermal Resource Act. The Commission was made the provincial regulator of geothermal resources on March 31, 2017.

The Geothermal Resources Act governs development and use of geothermal resources (80 degrees Celsius and above) and the Commission has jurisdiction over the operational requirements.

The Company envisions that hot brine from the Leduc reservoir will pass through a heat exchanger. This heat will flash a secondary (or binary) fluid to steam that pushes a turbine and generates power.

Initial metallurgical test work on E3 Metals Corp.’s proprietary lithium extraction technology produced a lithium concentrate of up to 1,206 milligrams per litre, a concentration factor of 16 times, the Calgary-based company said.

E3 Metals conducted six bench scale metallurgical tests of its concentration technology on lithium enriched Leduc Formation water (raw brine) from the Exshaw West Project Area in western Alberta.

With high porosity and permeability, the Leduc Formation has demonstrated the ability to deliver high volumes of hot (70 to 100 degrees Celsius/ 158 to 212 degrees Fahrenheit) brine. With extensive oil and gas infrastructure – including disposal wells, production sites and pipelines – and a mature regulatory regime, Alberta is an attractive jurisdiction for petro-lithium development, the company said.

The first position will work on the “Petrophysical and geomechanical characterisation of Variscan reservoir outcrop analogues and reservoirs” to contribute to the work of the second position, which will focus on the “Geothermal modelling of Variscan Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS) in granitic and metamorphic rocks”. Both are part of the EU-H2020 project “Multidisciplinary and multi-context demonstration of EGS exploration and Exploitation Techniques and potentials (MEET)”.

Geothermal is already a key sector in the development of renewable energy in France to reach the mid-term and long-term objectives fixed by the French law on energy transition ‘Loi de Transition Energétique pour la Croissance Verte (LTECV).

Thanks to its great experience in the Paris basin, France is leading the geothermal district heating market in Europe. More than 70 geothermal plants provide space heating in France. The majority of these installations have been installed in the 80s, and today they supply heating to around 300 000 Equivalent Dwelling Unit (EDU). In the Paris area, geothermal supplies heat to more than 187 000 EDU, which corresponds to more than 240 000 tonnes of CO2 avoided annually. In 2015, the French geothermal market represents 388 M€, in comparison with 282 M€ in 2013 (+38 %).

Vigorous eruption of lava continues from the lower East Rift Zone (LERZ) fissure system in the area of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens.

Fissure 8 remained very active Tuesday afternoon and evening, fountaining to heights of 200 feet at times and feeding a lava flow that advanced atop an existing flow (which was emplaced on Sunday night/Monday morning). After a finger of lava crossed Highway 132 earlier this afternoon near the PGV access road, the bulk of the lava remained on the south side of the highway, roughly paralleling the highway as it moved downslope.

UPDATE: Per Puna Geothermal Venture publicist: “Essential staff remains on site around-the-clock; non-essentials told not to report to the site. Lava has crossed the main entrance to facility”

The last update from Hawaiʻi County Civil Defense Agency indicates lava flow from Fissures 7 and 21 continued to advance through PGV property covering one well that was successfully plugged. It’s unclear if it has also passed over a second well that was about 100 feet away at last check. Civil Defense says the situation at PGV is stable, secured, and being monitored. Officials say neither well is expected to release any hydrogen sulfide — which has not been detected on property.

(From Google Translate) The increase in installed capacity of geothermal power plants and the increase of power plant efficiency has brought about the increase of geothermal based electricity production (in Turkey). Ufuk Şentürk, Chairman of the Association of Geothermal Power Plant Investors (JESDER), reported that the total installed power of geothermal power plants has increased to 1100 MW at the end of 2017 and is at 1,155 MWe in 2018. Şentürk said that in the first four months of the year, the increase in the amount of electricity generated at geothermal power plants was not only due to the growth in the total geothermal power plants board strength but also because of the more efficient operation of the plants.

Geothermal engineer and GRC Board Member Roland Horne discusses geothermal energy in the face of natural hazards and a way to tap the earth’s heat far from volcanoes in the future.

Local authorities warned that if lava were to reach a well at the Puna Geothermal Venture plant, hydrogen sulfide could be released. Where would that come from?
The source of hydrogen sulfide gas is the volcano itself. In normal operation, steam and hot water circulate through the plant and are reinjected without being released to the atmosphere. However, a breach of an unprotected well could allow the release of the volcano’s gases from the wells.

Would you have any reservations about siting a geothermal plant around a highly active volcano?
Not really. Geothermal plants work best where it’s hot, so a volcano is kind of a good place to put them. And many natural disasters affect power plants. Here in California, fires in 2015 burned cooling towers at the Geysers complex, the world’s largest geothermal facility. In the Philippines, the typhoon that wiped out Tacloban city in 2013 took out three geothermal plants. Blew the cooling towers away.

(From Google Translate) The Geothermal Energy Master Plan (with the subtitle 'a broad basis for a sustainable heat supply') has been drawn up and elaborated by DAGO (Dutch Association of Geothermal Operators), Stichting Platform Geothermie, Stichting Warmtenetwerk and EBN, supported by the Ministries of Economic Affairs and Climate and Home Affairs and Kingdom Relations. Many other parties were involved through interviews and work sessions.

Geothermal industry awards will be made across the following categories: Best Project, Best Financing Program, Best Project – Social and Environmental Impact, Best Government Geothermal Program, and Geothermal Leadership MVP.

The GEOLAC Project Award winners will be decided by an industry-leading Advisory Committee, including GRC Members.

Project awards will be judged across a series of criteria, including: innovative approaches to development, value to investors and customers, and social and environmental impact.

All entries must be received by June 8, 2018. The Awards will be announced at GEOLAC 2018 which will take place in Mexico City from July 17th-18th.

In response to broad demand from communities and businesses for electric power from renewable energy sources, Rocky Mountain Power is seeking cost-competitive bids for solar, wind and geothermal energy projects in Utah to interconnect to the PacifiCorp system.

Customers sponsoring the request for proposal include Park City, Salt Lake City, Summit County, Park City Mountain Resort, Deer Valley Resort, and Utah Valley University, which are all working with Rocky Mountain Power to meet their clean air and sustainability goals through renewable energy.

The company is seeking proposals for 308,000 megawatt hours of power generation, which equates to approximately 40 MW of geothermal capacity or approximately 100 to 126 MW of wind or solar capacity. This is enough electricity to power about 34,000 typical homes in Utah.

Drilling directly into magma may help humanity harness a vast new source of clean energy

Plunging tools into glowing-hot magma miles underground might sound fantastical. But in recent years, a handful of geothermal energy companies have done so without meaning to. The first documented case was actually at the Puna Geothermal Venture in Hawaii in 2005 -- the same plant that has been scrambling this month to remove flammable chemicals and shut its wells before lava pours in from Kilauea's ongoing eruption.

All the companies that struck magma were trying to find hot water that they could use to drive turbines, the traditional way of producing geothermal energy. Instead, their drill bits ground to a halt, unable to cut through the thick, sticky mush of molten rock.

A scientific drilling program in northeast China's Heilongjiang Province, called the Songke Second Drilling Well, has just completed an exercise that successfully reached 7,018 meters underground, reports People's Daily.

Aside from the technical achievement of the drilling itself, the program has highlighted the potential for the Songliao Basin to be a site for deep shale gas extraction or geothermal energy production. Samples drawn from the drill site have also provided evidence of what the climate was like during the Cretaceous period 145 to 65 million years ago.

View of the fissure complex is toward the southeast during a May 28 overflight of the lower East Rift Zone at about 1:15 p.m. HST. The lava channel in middle of photograph is filling with lava erupted from fissure 22. The Puna Geothermal Venture property is at the bottom right. COURTESY USGS

Ormat Technologies Inc. provides an update on the Puna geothermal power plant located about 15 miles away from the Kilauea volcano, which erupted on May 3, 2018 and which continues to erupt and flow lava.

On Sunday afternoon, May 27th (Hawaiian time), the approaching lava covered the wellheads of two geothermal wells. The company cannot assess at this stage the extent of the damage to the future functionality of these wells. The lava continues to flow and may reach other wells and areas of the Puna facility.

Ormat has property and business interruption insurance policies that include insurance coverage in a combined amount of up to $100 million in the event of volcanic eruptions and earthquake. The Company is working with its insurance broker and has provided notice to its insurance carriers regarding the situation at Puna.

Lava crossed into Puna Geothermal Venture (PGV) property Saturday night into Sunday and by Monday, Hawaii County Civil Defense confirmed, it had covered two wells, KS-5 and KS-6.

Officials say the flow on the property has since stopped, and there was no release of hydrogen sulfide gas during the event.

"We developed a strategy, which was to quench the well, plug the well, and remove topside equipment from the well so that it produces a low-profile to the oncoming lava, and we've accomplished that on all three production wells on pad E," Thomas Travis, Hawaii Emergency Management Agency administrator, and one of the people appointed by the governor to oversee the process of securing PGV, said on Sunday.

"All three of those wells have been plugged," he added. "Two of those wells have been quenched. We had to do a different kind of plug on KS-14, but it is plugged and all of the wells, presenting minimum interference to the lava. They're all close to the ground and covered, so the lava should go right over them."

We're told the valves on the top of the wells can easily withstand 2,000-degree lava.

Vigorous eruption of lava continues from the lower East Rift Zone (LERZ) fissure system in the area of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens.

Late this afternoon, vigorous fountaining resumed at Fissure 8, spawning a fast moving flow that moved north along Luana Street. As of 10:00 PM HST the flow front had reached within 300 yards of Kahukai street. The flow is traveling an estimated 20 yards per hour to the northeast. An overflight early this evening showed that Fissures 16, 18, 22,13, and 20 were active, with a flow moving south from Fissures 16/18.

The Geothermal Resources Council (GRC) is pleased to announce this year’s Amateur Photo Contest. The purpose of the contest is to showcase quality photography featuring geothermal energy around the world.

The first place winner will receive $150, second place - $100, and third place - $75. Honorable Mention photos will receive certificates.

Photographs on any subject related to geothermal energy can be submitted such as geothermal energy production, Enhanced Geothermal systems (EGS), direct use and geothermal heat pumps. These can include photos of well testing, drilling, operation of geothermal equipment, newly developed equipment, or plant operation, construction of a geothermal plant or plant site, and geological areas or surface manifestations (holding potential for geothermal exploration or development). New this year are acceptance of "GIFs" - short animated movies of a few seconds each.

Friday, May 25, 2018

Applications must be received by Midnight tonight - Friday May 25, 2018 to be considered.

The Geothermal Resources Council (GRC), a non-profit educational association dedicated to the promotion of geothermal energy and associated technologies around the world, has announced the following changes to the 2018 GRC Scholarship Awards:

In conjunction with the prestigious Annual Meeting, the GRC will also host an expo in which companies can promote projects, equipment, services, and technology to leading geothermal energy scientists, producers, renewable energy industry stakeholders, regulators, utilities, and key associated business leaders around the world.

Thursday, May 24, 2018

A Round-up of this week's geothermal energy news.......Click on the links to view the whole story and other news on Global Geothermal News.

This weekly summary of Global Geothermal News has been made available, once again, to all our friends in the international geothermal energy community. However, if you wish to take advantage of the many other benefits of membership of the Geothermal Resources Council, please join our association.......... - To those of you who are GRC Members - Thank you for your support!

(From Google Translate) The use of geothermal energy through near-surface drilling is increasing, but the potential-rich deep geothermal energy is stagnating. Now the industry is calling for start-up aid from the state.

Some swear by the potential of an inexhaustible source of energy, while others warn against self-generated earthquakes, toxic gases and radioactivity. As controversial as the use of heat from deep wells is, their reality is modest: according to the German Geothermal Association, there are just 36 power plants in Germany that are known as deep geothermal energy. Its 35 megawatts (MW) electric power equals twelve modern wind turbines. The heat output of 315 MW looks a bit more impressive, it roughly corresponds to the power of three modern gas-fired power plants. Although there are plans for around 30 other plants, there are currently only two under construction. One in the Bavarian Holzkirchen, the other in Munich.

Global Geothermal News is pleased to be a Lead Content Partner and the Geothermal Resources Council as a Partner for the GEOLAC conference.

July 17-18, 2018, Mexico City, Mexico

Co-hosted by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) and The World Bank, and featuring high level participation from SENER, this year’s event will gather governments, utilities, multilaterals, developers and capital providers to map the role of geothermal across LAC’s rapidly changing energy matrix, showcase emerging opportunities for investment, pinpoint regional obstacles, and highlight new sources of funding.

Nearly 1,000 attendees came to the 2017 GRC Annual Meeting and Expo from 35 different countries around the world, highlighting the GRC’s role in connecting the global community. With increasing interest in geothermal as a reliable source of renewable energy providing both flexible and baseload power production around the world, the GRC is looking ahead to an even stronger international attendance in 2018.

An underground aquifer could one day power hundreds of thousands of Saskatchewan homes. The project will be the first attempt to generate commercially viable electricity through geothermal power in Canada.

At the beginning of this month, Scherezade Diaz Martos, MSc in Sustainable Energy successfully defended her master’s thesis project, in which she conducted a steady state numerical modelling of the Los Humeros geothermal field.

Scherezade was supervised by Juliet Newson from Reykjavik University. Michael John O´Sullivan from the University of Auckland was present as an examiner.

Eruption of lava and ground cracking continues in the area of Leilani Estates and Lanipuna Gardens subdivision.

The middle portion of the fissure system continues to produce the most robust eruptive activity in the Lower East Rift Zone. The fountains from Fissure 22 feed a single lava channel that reaches the coast just north of MacKenzie State Park. The actual point of entry has continued shifting to the west. Fountains erupted from Fissures 5, 6, 13, and 19 continued to feed a lava flow advancing to the south along the west side of Fissure 22 flows that reached the ocean late this afternoon.There are now two ocean entry points that produce occasional small explosions.

U.S. Geological Survey scientist Wendy Stovall said Wednesday that lava erupting from a vent closest to Puna Geothermal Venture is shooting higher than lava coming out of other vents. She says it's also producing the highest lava wall, which is blocking molten rock from flowing north toward the plant.

Residents have been concerned about hazards if lava flowed over the plant's facilities or if the molten rock heated chemicals at the plant. Lava from the eruption on the Big Island is primarily flowing south toward the ocean.

Officials shut down Puna Geothermal shortly after Kilauea began erupting on May 3. On Tuesday, officials finished plugging wells that bring up hot liquid and steam that feed a turbine generator.

The last five years, geothermal energy has seen a slow but steady rise. District heating in Germany, France and the Netherlands is a success. Due to financial and regulatory constraints growth of Ultra Deep Geothermal (UDG) energy slackens, though. Can UDG serve as a renewable energy source in the Netherlands, now that it is phasing out Groninger gas?

Ultra deep geothermal energy (UDG) is ..... a chance for Dutch industry as well as a headache. Some forty percent of all energy demand in the Netherlands is heat; housing and process industry take an equal share. Up until now, UDG is used at two to three kilometres depth for sixteen greenhouses in Holland (Westland and Haarlemmermeer) but there are opportunities for other industries (like paper and dairy) as well. Moreover, the Dutch government recently announced that natural gas from its Groningen field has to be phased-out before 2023 (due to recent earthquakes in the Northern part of the country).